sad times

The last few weeks have been sad ones, and I have just not had it in me to sit down and blog. I really do want to. But I don’t.

The last week of June, my mother-in-law was staying with us because her 90-something year old grandmother was very sick and in the hospital. On Sunday, July 1, Grandmother passed away. She lived a very full life and we all knew that she was ready to go.

We went to her memorial service the following Saturday, which was held in Owasso, Oklahoma. We went up on Friday and spent the night. Stephen’s grandfather (different side of the family than his great-grandmother who had passed) also lives in Owasso, and he had been having a hard time getting over a surgery from a few months back. He wasn’t eating enough and his energy level was just low. His wife died last May, so I thought he needed some home-made meals. On Thursday, the day before we left for the memorial, I spent the day in the kitchen making meals for Grandpa. I wanted to make several different dishes that could be easily frozen and then taken out to thaw and cook. Grandpa had lost a lot of weight and I thought maybe he needed some yummy homemade comfort food.  I also express myself with food. I enjoy making things for others in order to comfort them. 

I spent the entire Thursday making regular chili, white chicken chili, chicken lasagna, poppy seed/ritz chicken casserole, hash brown casserole, and Paula Deen cinnamon rolls.  I think I ended up with 13 dishes – not including 5 cinnamon rolls, which we delivered to Grandpa on Friday when we rolled into town. He had already had company earlier in the day, and he tired SO easily, so he was exhausted when we got there. We were only there a few minutes – just long enough to give him hugs and talk to him a few minutes before putting away the meals I had made him and leaving to go to our hotel so that we could meet up with Stephen’s family.  I didn’t even take a picture of Grandpa with Christopher, but we planned on going back the next day, Saturday, after Grandmother’s memorial.

On Saturday, we stayed at the memorial longer than I had planned and when we decided to leave, Stephen’s mom told us that she was planning on visiting Grandpa (her dad) before she left town. So we decided to let him save his energy for Deanna. We just told her to make sure he had eaten and tell him that we loved him.

Long story short, Grandpa passed away of a heart attack on the evening of Monday, July ninth.  So we made our way back to Owasso for the second time in less than a week for his services. Grandpa’s funeral was Friday the thirteenth, one week to the day after I delivered my ice chest full of meals for him. I think all that he ate of it was a bowl of white chicken chili. Even though my mother-in-law had been telling us that his health was deteriorating, Stephen and I were not prepared for his death and we both took it really hard. I am still having a hard time with it.  I had told Stephen on Sunday, the day before he died, that I wanted to invite Grandpa to live with us so that we could take care of him. Stephen was shocked that I suggested it – but I told him, “He’s my grandpa too!”  And I really did consider him like a grandpa to me.

So, like I said – I am having a hard time. I will try to blog more once I am feeling better. Even this story has more that I need to add to it, but I just don’t have it in me.

Two years…big difference

Happy July!

As I was prepping for dinner this afternoon, my mind was wandering around the fact that tomorrow is the 4th of July. I remembered that when I decided to go back to school, I started with a summer session – classes began on the day after July 4th. I have a weird memory. I was thinking about how it’d been two years since I’d decided to go back to school, which led me to think about how it’d been two years since I’d quit a job I hated. (Wal-Mart.) I decided to look back on the blog and see if I had documented my last day at work. I found a post (this one) that stated that my last day at work had been June 29th and that my first day back to college (with my fourth and final major) would be July 5th.

I’ve come such a long way since then. I have a college degree! I’m certified to teach! I should (cross my fingers) never ever ever ever ever have to work at Walmart AGAIN!

I am so thankful.

However, how far I’ve come and how much I’ve changed is not the topic for this blog. As I was flipping (scrolling) through my blog posts from June 2010, I ran across these pictures…

WHERE DID MY BABY GO?!? It makes my heart hurt. These pictures are all from before he turned one and he’ll be three this summer.  THREE!!  He sleeps in a toddler bed. He doesn’t need a highchair anymore. He’s walking and talking and singing. He walked in the living room earlier and started singing his ABCs to me – first time he’s sang them alone and by himself, much less unprompted. I wanted to cry. And later, when he sang them for his daddy, I did cry.

I love this age… but man, the years are just flying by. There are days when I just want to rewind…just for a few minutes, and have him be a little baby again.

And I know in a few years when he’s starting preschool (hold me!) I will look back at his age now and think, “he was so little! when did he grow up?!”

Life.

Commenting Challenge, Day 5

Today’s topic is our Dream Vacation!

This is a hard question to answer. I’m not sure that I have a specific “dream vacation.” Stephen and I just got back from a cruise about a month ago. It was our second cruise together, and my third. I absolutely loved it, more so than my two previous cruises. It was sooo relaxing, just being away from everything and not having to worry about to-do lists. It was wonderful.  But I don’t really think that’s a dream vacation. To me, a dream vacation is something that we will probably never have the money to do. I imagine a dream vacation for us would be somewhere overseas. Stephen would probably say Ireland, and I would probably say England. We would both like to visit Australia, as well. Why is this such a hard question for me to answer? I think instead of one big dream vacation I would prefer smaller medium-size vacations every few years. Is that selfish?

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I’m so glad that I’ve done this challenge! I’ve found several new fun blogs to read and I hope I’ve gained a few new readers as well. I also feel like it’s kind of gotten me back in a blogging groove so I hope to continue to post on a semi-daily basis… maybe! I still have lots to catch up on just from this summer alone – like the cruise!  But for now, clean dishes and Walmart are calling my name. Happy Friday!

Commenting Challenge, Day 4!

Continuing on with Jenna’s Commenting Challenge today. Today’s topic is hobbies…

Well, let’s see… I would say my hobbies include cleaning house, picking up after my two-year-old son and 31-year-old husband, cooking, doing laundry, running errands… oh, wait…

I enjoy blogging and reading blogs, obviously. I love spending time with my family – my parents, brother and sister-in-law, mother-in-law, extended families, etc. I enjoy playing games… usually once or twice a week you can find Stephen and me playing card games with  my parents. We enjoy Hand & Foot and Spades.

Stephen and I both like to watch tv… although Stephen more than me. I’m a fan of crime shows like CSI and Law & Order… Stephen really isn’t. We both like to watch Grey’s Anatomy, The Big Bang Theory, Modern Family, and The Biggest Loser. Those are “our shows” during the fall/spring. We also like a few food network shows like Chopped, Restaurant Impossible, Next Food Network Star. During the summer we LOVE Big Brother.

I like to read, although I don’t read now nearly as much as I used to. My most recent read was the Shades of Grey series. To say I loved it would be an understatement. I know it’s cliché, but I also love love love the Harry Potter and Twilight series. I’m a romance novel girl… hand me a romantic fiction book and I’m all over it. I also enjoy most John Grisham books. I’m sure there are other more recent authors I would love but after I had Christopher and especially after I went back to college, I rarely read for pleasure. Maybe that will change now that I have my degree? Hopefully.

I love listening to music. Most days I would choose listening to Pandora over watching television. (Pandora’s Today’s Adult’s Top Hits Radio is what you can always find me listening to if I’m on Pandora.)  Right now I’m obsessed – OBSESSED with Adele. I could listen to the entire 21 album over.and.over.  Seriously.

I love to travel and vacation. My parents were always really good about taking us on fun family vacations when my brother and I were growing up, and now Stephen and I try to be like that. It’s hard sometimes because we are short on money right now, but we try to save up for small vacations – like Branson – at least once a year. Stephen and I just went on a cruise last month. Half of it was a Christmas gift from my parents, and the other half was my graduation gift from myself. (Or Stephen, seeing as how I haven’t really brought any money in over the past two years. Ha!) We LOVE cruises.  I also love snow-skiing… I’ve been several times with my family, but Stephen has never been, and I haven’t been since 2005. So our next big vacation will be snow-skiing, I think. 

I like to bake and throw parties and pretend like I’m a photographer and take walks and I love to jog – although you wouldn’t be able to tell that by looking at me! Ha! {Anybody else out there doing C25K?}

That’s all I can really think of right now. I’m hoping to find a few bloggers with hobbies and interests like mine!

Challenge Day 3!

Whoops! Forgot to blog yesterday. Actually, I didn’t forget.  I thought about it several times, but I was busy with other things all day. I spent a lot of time filling out an application for the local public school system… by some miracle (I believe it’s totally a God thing) there is an opening at the middle school here (as of YESTERDAY!) in my certification area. EEK! So exciting. I’m hoping and praying that this is “the job” for me. I could not have asked for more PERFECT timing or PERFECT position. I turned in my application this morning. I’m hoping to hear about an interview some time next week.

I thought I’d catch up on Jenna’s topics.  Yesterday’s topic - What is this blog about?  It’s pretty much your normal mommy-blog. I do occasionally try to blog about things other than my son and family, but I mainly blog about what we’re up to! Like most mom blogs, this is my “scrapbook” of sorts, and I try to document at least the big things that are happening in our life.  This year I’ve fallen behind, mainly because of my last semester of school being so crazy and time-consuming! I’m trying to catch up over the summer, but I haven’t blogged as much as I thought I would. I’m enjoying spending my time with Christopher and I hate to be on the computer when I could be spending time with him.

Today’s topic is Social Media!  I luuurve me some social media. I’m on Facebook, Twitter (@stephn85), Pinterest, and Instagram (@stephn85). My twitter account is protected and I limit who can see it – I have more people on my twitter who don’t know me “in real life” than people who do. I update Twitter more often than I do Facebook. Feel free to add me!

Favorite websites? I don’t really have any at this point. I love reading/lurking blogs. I check twitter and facebook multiple times a day. (I’m obsessed.) I try not to be on my computer a lot right now, so most of my online browsing is done on my iPhone (addicted to it) or my iPad (my parents got me one for graduation and I LOVE it.)

The hubby and I are headed out of town today to replace my lost Social Security card. There are days when I’m quite sure I would lose my head if it weren’t attached to my body….

Hi, Y’all!!

Hey! I am participating in Jenna’s Journey Commenting Challenge this year. Welcome to my little blog!

My name is Stephanie… I’m 26 years old, married to Stephen, and mommy to cutie-pie Christopher, who will be three in August. I live in a little town in Western Arkansas.  I just graduated from college last month. I’ve been in and out of college since I graduated high school in 2004. It was after my son was born that I decided I had to go back and finish my degree, as working as an associate at Walmart was not going to cut it for me or my family. So I spent two long, hard years commuting back and forth from Arkadelphia, Arkansas, (a 4-hour round trip commute) and finally finished up my BSE (education) degree last month.  I am now in the process of trying to find a teaching job! (You can scroll down a few entries to see my graduation post.)

My husband and I both love to travel, play games, have a good drink, and spend time with our families. We play cards with my parents on a weekly basis and my brother Tyler and sister-in-law Britney are our best friends.

My husband works at the local newspaper, but he is also in the process of finishing his degree – also in education. We’re looking forward to both finding teaching jobs and seeing what the next chapter of life brings us… we’re up for just about anything!

Thanks for visiting!

Stephen + Stephanie, September 2008

Christopher Tyler, August 2009

Christopher’s 1st Birthday, August 2010

Christopher’s 2nd Birthday, August 2011

Christopher & Me – May 2012

Britney, me, & Ty – HSU Graduation May 2012

Stephen + Stephanie, May 2012 – leaving on a cruise!

Christopher – June 2012

Wedding and Family!

Oh my... First post from my iPad! My parents got me one for graduation and aim in LOVE with it! Perfect gift for a new Business/Tech teacher!
Happy Father's Day to all the wonderful daddy's out there! To my wonderful dad and my husband...I am so thankful for both of you!